“Our original intent in creating Competitive Cyclist back in 2000 was to build a mind-blowing experience for roadies," said Competitive Cyclist founder Brendan Quirk, who is now the executive vice president of customer experience at Backcountry.com. "And while our mountain bike experience became every bit as good, our original focus was road."

"Compared to Real, everything about Competitive was a better experience for the road crowd," said Quirk. "It had better product content, better interactive tools, and a better breadth of assortment. In that sense, closing Real was probably overdue. Focusing on Competitive is in the best interest of our customers, our vendors, and our own ability to get stuff done."

RealCyclist customers can return any items to the site by going to RealCyclist.com. They can also redeem any existing RealCyclist gift cards on Competitive Cyclist and Backcountry.com.

“We want this to be a smooth transition for RealCyclist customers,” said Quirk. “We’ll do everything we can to make it that way.”